


Still and Storm

by battalions (Mina)



Category: Brand New
Genre: F/M, Het
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-02-03
Updated: 2012-02-03
Packaged: 2017-10-30 13:37:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 9,618
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/332307
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mina/pseuds/battalions
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jesse Lacey hated Annie Melbourne.<br/>She always thought so, anyway.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Past tense, third-person limited. Not strictly canon.
> 
>  
> 
> [Originally posted](http://stories.mibba.com/read/327588/Still-and-Storm/) on [Mibba](http://mibba.com) on October 17, 2010.

The show was great, naturally. Annie sat at a small table in the back, listening more than watching. It had been two years since she’d seen them live. They played a lot of the same songs, but some of it she’d never heard before.  
  
When they finished their set and trooped off stage, Annie gave them a two minute head start and then stood and slipped down the hall that led to the bathrooms. She still remembered the layout of this club – it was where she’d seen John play a real gig for the first time ever. She went through an unmarked door and down a flight of stairs, and then down another hall to “the green room”, which was really more of a large storage closet that happened to have an old couch.  
  
Maybe she should’ve knocked or something, but she just opened the door and stepped in. There was a moment of silence as the four men within stared at her, and then the one leaning against the side of the couch threw his arms up and cried, “Well Angela Melbourne, as I live and breathe.”  
  
“Vincenzo!” Annie replied, relieved to be well-received. She wasn’t sure why she was so anxious.  
  
Vinnie was something like Annie’s third cousin; what mattered was that their mothers had been best friends all their lives and Annie had therefore many times in her childhood been forced into spending time with said otherwise distant relations. She and Vinnie had always got along fine, but were four years apart; it was a surprise when Annie came home after her freshman year of college and discovered that Vinnie was smart and easy to talk to. The older they got, the smaller the age gap seemed. They generally only managed email conversations, the occasional phone call, and rarer-yet face-to-face visits; still, they were close.  
  
She and Vin hugged for a moment, but then he pulled back and pushed her square on her shoulders – not too hard, though. “What the fuck, why didn’t you tell me you were coming?”  
  
“Well then it wouldn’t be a surprise, would it?” she said with a grin. Over Vinnie’s shoulder, her eyes met those of Brian.  
  
“Hey, Bri,” Annie said cheerfully; he stood from his folding chair with a very kind smile and a “Hey, Annie,” and they shook hands. “Garrett,” she said next, offering a hand. He wrapped his arms around her waist instead and lifted her until she started laughing, batting at his shoulders for him to put her down.  
  
When her feet touched floor again, Annie turned her head to the far end of the room, where stood Jesse, watching them in stony silence. “Hey, Lacey,” Annie said with a nod, trying and failing not to sound nervous. He was just staring at her, like he didn’t even know who she was. Was it possible that he’d forgotten her? Well, if he had, Brian and Vinnie had both said her name. He could at least _pretend_. Why did he have to make everything so awkward?  
  
Jesse had always hated Annie. They went to high school together. For the first two years he’d been vaguely amicable, though mostly he ignored her. But then junior year, her friend Lauren started hanging out with Lacey and his group, and since Annie was nursing a crush on John, she tagged along to house parties and basement gatherings where she and Jesse were put into direct social contact. That was when his hatred of her really bloomed. It was totally irrational as far as Annie could tell. If Jesse said something stupid and everyone laughed, he’d glare at Annie like she was the only one making fun of him. If she joined in a conversation he was part of, he shut down; several times he just up and left. It bothered her for a long time, but eventually she’d accepted that some people just don’t like you for no reason and there’s nothing you can do about it.  
  
It got worse when Annie and John started dating, though. Jesse had always been protective of John – no, that wasn’t the right word… _possessive_ , more like. She knew it bothered John too – but they all kind of left it alone, since Jesse was never outright mean to her. It was a coldness; a coldness, as far as she could tell, reserved for her and only her. Annie couldn’t count the number of times she’d tried to start a conversation with him – at first because she thought he must be a cool guy, since John liked him so much; and later just for John’s sake, so it was clear she didn’t have anything against his best friend – but Jesse always brushed her off. And the fact that her breakup with John had left him in tears hardly did much to raise Annie’s standing in Jesse’s eyes.  
  
When Vinnie told her he’d joined a band with Lacey, she’d winced. Actually winced. She hadn’t expected it to last, though – bands were a dime a dozen on Long Island, constantly breaking up and reforming. What made it better – or maybe worse – was that she actually liked their music. Annie hadn’t seen them play much over the years, but she’d spent a lot of time listening.  
  
After a long, tense moment, Jesse gave Annie a nod and raised his beer slightly. That was good enough for the rest of them. Annie was corralled onto the couch, the focus of Vin, Garrett, and Brian’s combined attention.  
  
“So I thought you were supposed to be in Chicago,” said Garrett. “Weren’t you teaching there, or something?”  
  
“Yeah, I did Teach for America there after I graduated BU,” said Annie.  
  
“ _And then_ ,” Vinnie prompted. He looked up at the others. “This part’s really impressive.”  
  
Annie blushed and jabbed him with his elbow, “And then my second year doing that I started going to grad school at Northwestern, which I just finished up. And now I’m back here.”  
  
“No!” said Vinnie. “Tell us your official title. Wait!” He started a drum roll on his legs; Brian and Garrett quickly joined in.  
  
Annie sighed and rolled her eyes, feigning embarrassment that was only about half real. “Okay. _Officially_ , I am now a Master of Education.”  
  
“All hail the master!” shouted Vin in a sonorous voice, setting off a wave of bowing and scraping.  
  
“Oh, shut up,” said Annie, smiling in the way that made her one dimple show.  
  
“So when you say you're _back_ ,” said Vinnie slyly, recovered from his posturing subservience, “do you mean back like _moved back_? Don’t tell me you moved back exactly before we started touring again.”  
  
“That’s right, you guys have an album coming out, don’t you?” Annie said, happy to take the opportunity to move attention away from herself. She never much liked the spotlight in groups, but she felt even more self-conscious with Jesse in the room.  
  
“Yeah we do!” exulted Vin.  
  
Brian tugged at his collar. “Lot of accomplishment in the room, huh?”  
  
“You’re right,” said Garrett, leaping up. “We deserve drinks.”  
  
“Yes! Drinks!” agreed Vinnie. “It’s barely even illegal for me anymore.”  
  
“But you guys have drinks,” said Annie, gesturing at the six-pack resting ineffectually on top of a cooler.  
  
“No, we need real drinks,” said Brian. “Bar upstairs, come on!”  
  
“But…” Annie protested. She didn’t want to intrude on them anymore than she already had – she knew Jesse would be mad about it, and it wasn’t like she couldn’t catch up with them another time.  
  
“Annie!” Vinnie cried suddenly, faking outrage. “Are you saying you’re too good for a drunken night of debauchery with your dearest Long Island cousin? For shame, Anna-banana, for _shame_ ”  
  
That settled it for everyone. They headed back upstairs and directly to the bar, where Annie couldn’t even reach for her wallet before a beer was bought for her; she wasn’t half done with it before another one was pushed her way. Everyone was very excited to hear that she had secured a job teaching at a swanky private high school in Manhattan in the fall and had managed to find an apartment she could afford in the interim. Except, predictably, Jesse. Brian and Garrett were in between her and him, but Annie still noticed that he did not look her way once; he just drank in silence except for a few interruptions from lingering fans. And she noticed when he abruptly stood and left, without so much as a word to the others. Shortly after, Annie managed to extricate herself from the bar, claiming jet-lag – by this point the boys were too far gone to realize that Chicago was an hour _behind_ New York. She left through the back door and shuffled towards her car, making herself say the alphabet backwards in her head to be sure she was all right to drive. And then she heard him.  
  
“Hey.”  
  
Jesse’s voice. Unmistakable. For a moment, she wondered if she’d wanted this to happen – if she’d left just ten minutes after him on purpose, hoping he’d wait for her.  
  
She turned and saw him, sitting with his back against the building on the broad stoop she’d just stepped down. If she’d thrown open the door, it would’ve hit him.  
  
“Jesse, hi,” she said, a little breathier than she meant to. She hated herself for wanting him to like her.  
  
“You leaving?”  
  
“Yup,” Annie said with a sycophantic nod. “I’m tired,” she offered by way of explanation.  
  
“I’ll bet,” Jesse said. That set her on edge. Why did he always have to be like that?  
  
“Okay, well, see you around, I guess,” said Annie, turning back towards the parking lot.  
  
“Ann. Wait.”  
  
Annie turned back. “Ann” was her grown up name – what she told people to call her at job interviews. John used to call her that a lot; Annie, meanwhile, was constantly calling him “John Boy”, like _The Waltons_.  
  
“Why’d you come back here?”  
  
“Wh-what?” she stuttered.  
  
“Why did you come back here? What do you want?”  
  
 _Aha_. Annie sighed sharply. “Jesus Christ, Jesse, I’m just back here to see my parents. I’m not trying to get back together with John or anything. I mean, shit, it’s been like seven years. And I thought you guys weren’t even friends anymore.”  
  
“We’re not,” said Jesse, lumbering to his feet. It was only then that Annie saw the bottle of beer in his hand. “But that’s not what I meant. Why are you back _here_ , at this bar? Why did you come see the show?”  
  
Annie felt stupid for implying that Jesse had accused her of being in some ridiculous plot to win back John. She felt stupider for being completely thrown off by his question.  
  
“What do you mean?” she asked. “Vin’s my friend,” she added defensively. She was allowed to see his shows, dammit. She was allowed to catch up with friends. Fuck Jesse Lacey and his pseudo-psychological bullshit line of questioning.  
  
“I mean if you want something,” he said, moving towards her, “you should just ask for it.”  
  
He was close enough now that she could smell the alcohol on his breath. His deep-set eyes were focused right on her, though.  
  
“Jeez, Lacey,” Annie mumbled, averting her eyes. “I don’t want anything from you, okay? I just wanted to catch up with some friends. And I have. They're all yours again. I’m leaving.”  
  
And with that she turned and strode off to her car, the soles of her shoes slapping smartly against the pavement.


	2. Chapter 2

Annie lost her virginity to John on the night of their senior prom.  
  
The timing wasn’t as much a function of sentimentality as practicality. Annie was ready well before prom, but she didn’t want to lose it in the backseat of a car or in some random upstairs bedroom at a party, and both her and John’s houses left something to be desired in terms of privacy. Annie’s mother was so good at returning from errands at exactly the wrong moment that Annie suspected she did it on purpose.  
  
But everyone’s parents understood that senior prom was accompanied by a weekend of partying at the beach. Of course, Annie’s parents thought she was sharing a room with her friend Amy, not John – but what they didn’t know wouldn’t hurt them.  
  
John had been really nice to her about waiting. He wasn’t technically a virgin; he’d had sex all of three times with two different girls. He was nervous too, as they sat on the sagging motel bed in their underwear, all three of the door’s locks engaged and the blinds firmly shut. His hands trembled as he unwrapped the condom.  
  
After, he told her how beautiful she was over and over again. He told her he wished it had been his first time, too, because it meant so much more to him than anything else he’d ever done with anyone else. He hoped he hadn’t hurt her or anything, and he was sorry he didn’t make her come (he shouldn’t have been; she hadn’t expected to and he did manage to accomplish the feat an impressive four times over the following summer). Annie felt significantly older than him as she eased his post-coital anxieties, even though she was a solid six months younger.  
  
John fell asleep shortly after the talking petered out, but Annie was wide awake. She watched John sleep for a little bit, then rolled to her back and stared at the ceiling. The room smelled like sex and she couldn’t remember if it always had or if they had made it so.  
  
She never really decided to go out for some fresh air, but she found herself doing it anyway. She pulled on the first tank-top she dug out of her bag. Then her eyes fell on John’s boxers, lying discarded on the floor, and, feeling bold, she put them on. Girls in movies pulled that kind of shit all the time.  
  
Stepping out onto the concrete walkway outside their second-floor room, Annie caught a breeze from the ocean. Her nose filled with the familiar scent of salted air that made her think of sunscreen and the feeling of a wet bathing suit against goose-bumped flesh. She wished she’d worn a sweater but didn’t bother to go back inside for one. Down in the courtyard, much of Annie’s high school class was still partying. The smoke from their cigarettes and the noise of their conversations rose above them in a lazy haze.  
  
Annie looked down the walkway to her left and saw a figure sitting about three rooms away with his back against the railing. Immediately she recognized that it was Jesse. She walked towards him, again not conscious of making the decision to move.  
  
As she got closer she saw that he had a bottle of liquor with him. She thought about making a joke about him drinking alone but didn’t know that he’d take it the right way. He looked up when she was nearly there, his eyes first searching her face and then traveling down until they landed on John’s boxers. The change in his expression was tiny – maybe only in Annie’s imagination – but she was certain that he knew what had happened. Jesse turned away from her and brought the bottle to his lips.  
  
“Hey,” she said. She sat down beside him. He was wearing a bulky sweatshirt and the sleeve grazed her bare arm.  
  
“Hey,” Jesse mumbled, and he passed her the bottle. She took a cautious sip. Whisky. It burned her throat.  
  
Much to Annie’s surprise, she started crying then. She didn’t really know why. She’d never romanticized her virginity too much. She was completely comfortable with giving it up to John – he was cute and kind and she loved him; she knew it wouldn’t last forever but she knew that that didn’t matter, either; it was unrealistic to expect to only sleep with one guy her whole life and wasn’t even something she would’ve picked if given the option. Sure her first time was a big deal, but it wasn’t the most important thing that would ever happen to her and all things considered, it had gone as well as it possibly could have.  
  
Annie knew all this but she was still crying. The sense of loss hit her so unexpectedly that the shock of it made the tears come faster. And when she couldn’t suppress a sniffle, and Jesse looked over and saw the otherwise silent tears pouring down her face, the embarrassment of being caught crying on prom night by Jesse Lacey of all people made everything ten times worse and it quickly became clear that this crying thing wasn’t going to stop anytime soon.  
  
Jesse gently took the bottle from her hands and set it down on his other side. Then he scooted over until their hips were pressed together and put his arm around her shoulders. Annie welcomed the invitation to bury her face in his chest, the soft, dark fabric of his sweatshirt quietly absorbing the variety of embarrassing fluids now present on her face. She felt him rub her back as she shuddered out muffled sobs, and she felt his hot breath in her ear as he murmured “It’s okay…it’s going to be okay.”  
  


*

  
The buzzer sounded sharply in Annie’s quiet apartment.  
  
She was sitting on her one and only housewarming present: a futon with a very fancy wooden frame from her parents. It went from a comfy queen-size bed into a sofa with a relatively small amount of effort, but even so she’d given up switching it back and forth after about three days. Instead she bought several pillows and lined them up against the wall to give her bed the illusion of a back.  
  
For a moment Annie stared at her door, very confused. She wasn’t expecting anyone and it was not exactly prime pop-in hours – eleven on a Tuesday night. She didn’t even really know anyone who would pop in on her. She hadn’t gotten random drunk buzzes here the way she used to in Chicago – though she’d been in the building less than a month. Maybe someone was looking for a neighbor?  
  
Cautiously, Annie went to the speaker and pressed the button to talk. “Hello?” She pressed the listen button, chewing on the inside of her bottom lip.  
  
“Hey. It’s Jesse. Lacey.”  
  
Her finger released the button as though it had electrocuted her. _Okay, deep breath_. She had to deal with this. She pressed the talk button again. “Sorry, what’d you say?”  
  
“It’s Jesse. Can I come up?”  
  
Annie stared blankly at the speaker like it would give her answers. “Okay,” she said, and she pressed the button to unlock the front door.  
  
Then she panicked. She stared wildly around the room and then swept about, trying to locate and hide any embarrassing items but instead just shoving her purse in her dresser and moving a bottle of water from on top of the TV to her bedside table. Well before she was ready, there was a knock on her door.  
  
She checked through the peephole just to be sure it was him. Yup, Jesse Lacey, broody face and all. She wondered if the appearance at her door of anyone else in the tri-state area would have surprised her more. Maybe Woody Allen or something. Probably not.  
  
When she opened the door he gave her a very small smile and a very simple, “Hi.”  
  
“Hi,” Annie said, stepping aside to let him through.  
  
He came in just far enough that Annie could close the door behind him. “Sorry to drop by this late,” he said.  
  
Annie gave him another few moments to continue speaking before responding herself. She was both surprised and very irritated that he hadn’t immediately offered an explanation. Even someone she was friends with would have felt socially obligated to explain why he had shown up at her house at eleven o’clock on a Tuesday night, and Jesse and her fit no one’s definition of “friends”. But no, he wouldn’t tell her why he was here – he’d just stand there and chit-chat. Well, she wasn’t going to give in and ask him.  
  
“Um, it’s okay,” she said finally. “I’m not so old that I think eleven is late.” Not late for _her_. Late for unexpected visitors who didn’t like her, though.  
  
“This place is nice,” said Jesse, scanning her apartment. “I like the color.”  
  
Damn him for knowing her weakness. “Thanks,” she said honestly. She’d painted the walls herself. “Yeah, it’s a little small, obviously,” she waved her arm demonstratively around her only room, “but there’s a walk-in closet and it’s near the school I’m working at in the fall. Plus the bodega across the street has my favorite kind of orange juice.” She gave a little self-conscious chuckle. “So I guess I’m set.”  
  
“Tropicana, no pulp, calcium-enriched,” Jesse said.  
  
Annie froze, staring at Jesse’s profile as he continued to gaze impassively at the walls of her apartment. “What? How – how do you know that?”  
  
Jesse’s eyes flicked just barely to hers. “My eighteenth birthday. Everyone stayed over at John’s, and in the morning you got really excited because he had exactly the kind of orange juice you liked.”  
  
Annie remembered. John’s parents went away for their twentieth wedding anniversary the day before Jesse’s birthday. John threw a massive party and a bunch of people, Annie included, ended up sleeping it off on the floor of his basement. The next morning – well, more like late afternoon – John and Michelle made waffles for everyone, and Annie, more hungover than she’d ever been in her life at that point, was so pleased to have the right kind of orange juice with her breakfast that she threw her hands over her head and let out a very feeble “Yaaaaaay!” John had said, “Aw, Ann, you’re too cute,” and kissed her forehead.  
  
Jesse was there – the birthday boy and everything – but never in a million years would Annie have guessed that he’d noticed such a trivial moment – let alone that he’d remember it for so long.  
  
“Oh,” was all she said.  
  
Jesse moved deeper into the room, inspecting her possessions as closely as she feared he would. His fingers grazed the “USED SAVES” sticker on the spine of a book she’d bought for college and kept. Past her bookshelf was her CD rack, and Jesse turned and shot Annie a disarming grin before leaning down to scrutinize the titles. She should’ve known that was the one thing in the apartment to hide. Musicians were so judgmental about other people’s music.  
  
Annie took a seat on the corner of her bed. She felt a little better now; this was vaguely normal, what he was doing, and he’d actually smiled at her as though being in her presence didn’t make him miserable.  
  
He turned around to face her holding three CDs: an early demo Brand New had never officially released, _Your Favorite Weapon_ , and the split EP they did with Safety in Numbers. “You have all our stuff.”  
  
“Are you kidding? Of course I do,” said Annie. “I have the vinyl release too,” she added, gesturing the record player in the corner. “And a box of merch in the closet.”  
  
Jesse followed her gaze, smiling as he saw the sleeve resting on the glass top. “I didn’t know you were such a big fan.”  
  
Annie rolled her eyes with a playful smile. “Well shit, even if I hated you’d guys I’d have everything you made. Do you not realize what a big deal it is that you guys are a _real band_? You have a music video that’s been on _TV_.”  
  
Jesse’s cheeks colored faintly. “You saw it?”  
  
“Yeah I saw it! The first time –,” and she started laughing already at the memory – “I was at my friend’s place in Chicago – there were a few of us, and we were sitting around watching TV, and my friend Jen was flipping through the channels, and suddenly I just see Garrett’s giant shaggy head.” She dissolved into laughter for a moment, encouraged by the fact that Jesse was joining her. “And I screamed, _‘I know them! I know them! They’re from Long Island!’_ and my friend Connie screams back, _‘Oh my god, Annie, you don’t know everyone in Long Island just because you’re from there!’_ And we totally woke up the crotchety old man downstairs; he freaked out. It was so funny. All my friends were very impressed when I explained how I _actually_ know you guys, though. I earned a lot of street cred that night, let me tell you.”  
  
Jesse was laughing, and Annie got a giddy feeling in her stomach. It was strange to finally achieve this small goal she’d had in high school.  
  
“Well, I for one promise to do everything in my power to make Brand New crazy popular,” said Jesse. “Solely for the purpose of increasing your street cred, of course.”  
  
“Oh, you’re too good,” said Annie.  
  
Jesse turned back to the CD rack to put away those he had removed; when he turned to face her again, he was holding a stack of Taking Back Sunday discs – _Tell All Your Friends_ and the EPs and demos released before it. “So you’ll just buy anything if you know the guys who wrote it, huh?”  
  
“Absolutely,” said Annie with an unrepentant shrug.  
  
“You know John left, right? And Shaun Cooper?” His tone was more somber now.  
  
“Yeah, I heard,” said Annie. She watched Jesse carefully, trying to guess what he was getting at.  
  
“What does that mean for your future as a loyal customer of all things Taking Back Sunday?” asked Jesse in an almost playful tone.  
  
Annie laughed, releasing her tension as quickly as it had come. “Uh, well, I met Adam Lazzara at a party once and he was really drunk and he spent like twenty minutes trying to pick me up with some of the worst lines you’ve ever heard. So I think that’s reason enough to keep listening.”  
  
“Did it work?” Seeing the confusion on Annie’s face, Jesse elaborated. “Adam’s attempt to pick you up.”  
  
“What? No!” Annie was uneasy about how quickly Jesse had returned to his serious tone. She did her best to lighten the mood. “Jeez, Lacey, what kind of girl do you think I am?” Jesse shook his head with a chortle. “Oh!” Annie said suddenly, “I know what kind of girl I am – a terrible hostess.”  
  
She jumped up and went to her kitchen, which was really more of a glorified alcove. “Do you want something to drink? Eat? I probably have enough to make you something…” She opened the door of the refrigerator, scanning its contents. “Ooo, I have Chinese leftovers! Are you hungry?” she called over her shoulder.  
  
There was silence for a long moment, and then Jesse called back, “I could eat.”


	3. Chapter 3

The kitchen just wasn’t big enough for two people, so Annie called out options to Jesse and dished out what he picked. When she emerged holding two warm plates, Jesse was standing near her bed with his hands in his pockets.  
  
“I don’t have a real table,” Annie explained, setting the food on either side of her coffee table, “but I figure if I make a big deal of telling people that traditional Asian cultures eat on the floor from low tables, I’ll seem like a trendy urbanite instead of just poor. What do you think?”  
  
“Oh sure,” said Jesse. “But honestly, you had me sold with the exotic cuisine.”  
  
Annie laughed and darted back into the kitchen, “Um…okay, I really only have water, orange juice, and coffee,” she said. She poked her head through the doorway, “Do you want me to run out and get you something? It’d be no trouble.” She was _very_ pleased with how friendly she was being. It was much harder to be mean to people who were nice to you.  
  
“Water’s fine,” said Jesse.  
  
She returned with two glasses of water and they fell to eating. For several minutes they ate in companionable silence. Annie subtly checked Jesse’s expression a few times. He appeared to be thinking very hard. The night was starting to feel like a marathon – a competition to sustain the friendly vibe. Annie wanted to win.  
  
Jesse broke the silence. “Do you remember when we met?”  
  
“What, in high school?” asked Annie.  
  
“Yeah. It was ninth grade history. I sat on your left and John sat on your right.”  
  
“Oh, wow,” said Annie quietly. The long dormant memories lit up in her mind. John and Jesse had played paper football across her desk just to annoy her, and though she’d shot many contemptuous hair tosses and sniffs in their direction, she’d secretly been delighted to have attracted the attention of two boys. They had initially been upset that the alphabetical-order seating arrangement had separated them, but by the end of the year the three had build up something of a rapport; John told Annie little jokes every now and then and Annie loaned Jesse pencils when they had tests because he only ever carried around pens.  
  
“Gosh, that was ages ago!” said Annie. “That was –” She cut herself off, but before she even had a moment to think of how to cover it up, Jesse pounced on her.  
  
“‘That was’ what?” he asked.  
  
“Um,” Annie said. She took a sip of water. “I was just going to say that was so long ago. We were kids.”  
  
“That wasn’t what you were going to say,” said Jesse. He’d stopped eating.  
  
 _Fuck_. He couldn’t let anything go. Annie sighed. “I was going to say that was when you were almost being nice to me. But look, Jesse, I don’t mean anything by it, okay?”  
  
Jesse was silent for a moment. “So you think I was mean to you? Later?”  
  
It had been going so well. “Um…” Annie tried to figure out the best way to phrase herself without actually lying. Jesse could always smell a lie. “Well, you weren’t really mean to me, I guess, but you weren’t exactly nice to me either. I don’t care though. It was years ago. It’s okay that you didn’t like me.” She braced herself, waiting for him to finally announce that he still didn’t like her; he hated her, what the fuck was wrong with her?  
  
Another long pause. “I always thought _you_ didn’t like _me_.” Jesse picked up his fork again and stabbed a piece of General Tso’s chicken.  
  
“What? _Really?_ ”  
  
He shrugged. “I guess I always thought you could tell.”  
  
This did nothing to alleviate Annie’s confusion. “Tell _what_?”  
  
“That I’m a bad person,” said Jesse calmly. He took another bite of chicken.  
  
“You’re not a bad person,” said Annie. It popped out before she even thought about it – but once she did, she didn’t regret it. Not liking her didn’t make someone a bad person.  
  
“You don’t think so?” asked Jesse. He seemed more amused than anything.  
  
“No. I don’t,” said Annie, more firmly this time.  
  
“Why not? If I was mean to you, then what makes you think I’m a good person? Or not a bad person, or whatever?”  
  
Annie bit the inside of her lip, blushing a little at the first memory that came to mind. “Because on prom night you let me cry on your sweatshirt even though I was all sniffley and gross.”  
  
“Maybe I was just trying to get into your pants.”  
  
Annie gave a bark of laughter. “If you were, you did a piss-poor job of it.” She had never even considered this as an explanation for Jesse’s unexpected kindness. Her first thought was that he’d decided she would stop crying and leave him alone more quickly if he’d shown her some fake sympathy, but she’d eventually dismissed that too. His gentle touch and voice had seemed so genuine to her.  
  
She’d expected he would return to the topic of whether or not he was good or bad or what, but he was now watching her very intently and asked, “Why were you crying that night?”  
  
“Uh…” Maybe the last thing Annie wanted to talk about with Jesse was the emotional ramifications of her sexual experiences.  
  
“At first I thought you guys fought, but then John never said anything, so I thought he must have done something to you without realizing.” There was anxiety in his voice.  
  
“John never hurt me,” Annie said softly. “He didn’t do anything, I just…” She cleared her throat. “Um…that night was kind of…it was my first time.” She kept her eyes fixed on the handle of the lowest drawer of her dresser, mortified. “And, I don’t know, I guess it was more emotional than I thought it would be. It finally hit me that my life was changing… I mean, aside from… _that_ , senior year was nearly over, and I was leaving for college in Boston in the fall… And I think that was when I really realized that John and I were going to break up. It was overwhelming.”  
  
“He was really cut up about it, you know. When you ended it.”  
  
Annie turned her head back to Jesse and met his eyes for just a moment. He was still watching her carefully. She sighed. “Yeah, I know. I was too. I didn’t really want to split up, but I knew we couldn’t handle the long-distance thing. Honestly, I kind of thought he would cheat on me.” She studiously avoided his gaze, not at all keen to see how Jesse would react to mention of John and cheating tied up together like that. “I guess first loves are always hard.”  
  
Jesse fiddled with his fork for a moment, then looked up again. “Did you, then? Love him?”  
  
Annie thought about this seriously before answering. “Well, I definitely loved him…well, you know, the way you love a friend. I loved being with him, and our relationship… But as for an earth-shattering, life-changing, intense soul connection, I didn’t feel that. I’ve never really felt that with anybody, to be honest.” She took a moment to wonder how she’d ended up talking about her conceptualization of and experience with love with Jesse Lacey on a Tuesday night, but shrugged it off. He didn’t seem angry with her, and he seemed to be saying that he never was.  
  
Jesse merely nodded at this confession and went back to his food. Annie did too. They finished their meal in silence. Annie took their dishes into the kitchen. When she returned, Jesse was standing again; he seemed unsure of where to sit. Other than her bed, there was only an armchair, which was currently hosting a box of files she’d yet to find a place for and a small pile of clothes that had never made it to the laundry bag.  
  
“The bed actually turns into a really nice couch,” Annie said as she went past him and climbed to the far corner, “but I’m super lazy.”  
  
“That’s okay,” said Jesse, taking the hint and arranging himself in the corner opposite to her. He faced the TV instead of Annie, but he didn’t seem hostile. Just pensive.  
  
Annie had considered hinting that it was time for Jesse to leave while cleaning up in the kitchen, but ultimately decided against it; he had shown up for something and it probably wasn’t Chinese food. For the same reason, she didn’t offer to turn on the TV as she might’ve done normally.  
  
Jesse grew increasingly agitated as they sat there. He started chewing on his nails, but then stopped, glanced briefly at Annie, took a deep breath, and then said, “Why did you pick John?”  
  
“What do you mean?” asked Annie, guarded. She really hoped he didn’t want to start talking about the loss of her virginity again.  
  
“I mean, we sat on either side of you in freshman history. And we liked the same things and did the same things and got about the same grades. Is he really that much better looking than me?”  
  
“You mean why did I pick him – like why did I like him…instead of you?” Annie was starting to feel very, _very_ uneasy. Jesse’s heavy brow was deeply furrowed. She took his silence and noncommittal shrug for confirmation, and let out a breath. “I don’t know – why does anyone like anyone? It wasn’t a conscious choice or anything.”  
  
Another quick glance in her direction. “There wasn’t a moment, though, when he pulled ahead? Or did you like him better from the start?”  
  
There _was_ a moment. How did he know that? “The first party I went to that you two were at,” Annie said quietly. “Junior year. I went with this friend and her boyfriend; he was friends with you guys – Paul something – and the three of us went over to say hi, and my friend said something funny, and John just gave this huge grin. His whole face lit up. That was when I started to like him.”  
  
Jesse nodded and continued to stare ahead of him.  
  
“What does it matter, anyway?” Annie asked, aware she was being careless with her tone. She felt sick to her stomach. “Why do you care that some girl you didn’t like had a crush on your friend in high school instead of you?”  
  
He was slow to respond. “I just wanted to know,” he said, “why everyone always picks him.”  
  
There was a pause while that sank in. “Jesus Christ, I _knew_ it. I knew that was what this was about.” Annie pinched the bridge of her nose, angry now. “I can’t believe you. You’re still pissed off that he slept with your girlfriend, so, what, you’re going around asking all his ex-girlfriends why they liked him and not you? Is that it?”  
  
“That’s not it at _all_ ,” said Jesse, straightening up and finally really looking at her. “I’m only asking you. Just you.”  
  
“Well why me? What makes me so fucking special? Why don’t you ask whatever skank it was that cheated on you? Or the two girls John slept with before me, or however many other he’s slept with since? What, was I the only one stupid enough to buzz you up?”  
  
He looked hurt but she didn’t care. “You’re the most important. You know why. I know you do.”  
  
“I guess neither of us knows everything, then, because I have no idea what the fuck you’re talking about. Why am I important, Jesse? Go on, enlighten me.”  
  
“Because I’m in love with you.”  
  
Annie froze for just a moment. “I’m sorry, _what?_ ”  
  
“I’m in love with you. I’ve been in love with you since the ninth grade.”  
  
“You’ve been in love with me since the ninth grade.”  
  
“Yes.”  
  
“This is a really dumb joke to play.”  
  
“It’s not a joke. I thought you knew. I thought you could tell. I’m in love with you.”  
  
“So you’ve been in love with me for eleven years.”  
  
“Approximately.”  
  
“And you’ve just been pining away. Over me. For eleven years.”  
  
“Well…yeah, more or less.”  
  
 _“Fuck you Jesse Lacey! I am not your fucking Daisy!”_  
  
“What?”  
  
“Oh yeah, like I’m going to believe an emo mother _fucker_ like you isn’t up on his F. Scott Fitzgerald.” Annie seized a pillow and began beating Jesse with it, his head and arms and anywhere she could reach. “ _The Great Gatsby_? You are _not_ Gatsby, so don’t even pretend like you bought a house across the bay from me and you sit out at nights _staring at the green light at the end of my goddamn dock!_ I am _not_ your Daisy!”  
  
She dropped the pillow, the physicality of her anger spent, but continued to assault him verbally. “Like I don’t fucking _know_ that you’ve dated a million girls. Like you don’t fall in love every goddamn day! You’re not in love with me, you just hate John. You hate John and you want to find more reasons to hate him and you’re fucking _delusional_ ; that’s what’s going on here.”  
  
“I don’t love you?” Jesse burst out; it was the loudest she’d ever heard him yell. “If I didn’t love you, how would I know that in freshman history you were the only one who always did the reading, and the only one who enjoyed Mr. Gregson’s discussion questions, because you actually _like_ thinking about history? Huh? I know a lot of stuff about you. I know that in Chemistry when we had to pick lab partners, your friend Lauren was going to partner with you but you backed out so that that girl everyone hated – Heather…Heather Fishburn, so that Heather Fishburn would have someone to partner with. And in the mornings you would talk to her before school and sometimes you would do her hair for her. And when you go to diners, you usually order curly fries and a coffee, but if you’re drunk you order pancakes. And it’s not because pancakes are your drunk food, it’s because you love them but you’re too embarrassed to order them when all the other girls eat like rabbits. Unless you're drunk. And you always carry cherry Chapstick with you. And your eyes are the color of the ocean when a storm is coming. And when you find a penny tails up, you always turn it over and leave it for someone else to find, no matter what.”  
  
That shut Annie up. How did he _do_ that? How could he possibly know all that about her?  
  
“We had English together senior year,” Jesse said, speaking in a quiet, even voice, “and when we did peer-review for that life-writing workshop, I got your paper.”  
  
“Those were anonymous,” Annie said quickly. She suddenly remembered how irritated she’d been when her paper was returned to her without a single peer comment.  
  
“I looked on the back and I recognized your initials. But I would’ve known it was you anyway. You wrote about when your mom found a lump in her breast. And the doctors thought it might be cancerous, so they did a lumpectomy right away. And you were really scared. And when the results came back saying the tumor was benign, you were so happy that you wrote ‘benign’ on the back of all your notebooks and around the bottom of your sneakers. I remember that. That was 10th grade. I asked you why you wrote that on your sneakers, and you told me that ‘benign’ was the most beautiful word in the English language.  
  
“You wrote that when you found out your mother might have breast cancer, you were really upset, mostly because you loved her, but a selfish part of you was upset because you knew losing her meant losing one of the only two people on the planet who would always take care of you. Who would always put you first, no questions asked, for nothing in return. Who didn’t just love you unconditionally, but who actually wanted to do everything they possibly could to make you happy. And when you found out she didn’t have cancer, you weren’t just relieved because you loved her, or because you knew she was going to be around to take care of you; you were also relieved because it meant you wouldn’t have to confront that selfish part of you, at least not for a while longer.  
  
“When I read your paper, that was when I realized I was really in love with you. I thought you must have written it for me. I thought you’d designed it so that I would know we had a connection. For a week, I waited. I thought you were going to break up with John, and then come to me and say, ‘Jesse, I have something I want you to read,’ and I would say, ‘I already have.’ And you would be nervous, and you would say, ‘You have?’ and I would say, ‘Yes. I loved it.’ And you would blurt out, ‘I love you!’ And you would blush and be horrified and I would say, ‘It’s okay. I love you too. I’ve always loved you.’ For a week, I thought that was going to happen. Every time I heard the phone ring, every time you walked towards me in the hall at school – I thought, _This is it, it’s going to happen_. And when I finally realized it wasn’t going to, what was worse than the disappointment, worse than knowing you hadn’t written it for me, was knowing that you were perfect for me without even trying.”  
  
As he spoke, Annie drew her legs to her chest, wrapping her arms around them and chewing meditatively on her lip. When he finished, she stayed silent for several minutes. She _had_ written all that for her senior life-writing piece.  
  
“Jesse,” said Annie carefully, “look, maybe you did love me in high school. I don’t know. And I’m sure everything that happened with you and John must have reminded you of those feelings. But you know you haven’t been in love with me all this time. You _know_ that.”  
  
He looked up at her from under his brow, his mouth open as though he wanted to say something, but he just closed it and swallowed.  
  
“Jesse, come on, I don’t have to tell you. I mean, you must’ve written two dozen love songs in the past few years, and none of them are about me.”  
  
“They’re all about you.”  
  
“Jesse –”  
  
“They are. Because it always comes back to you. Every relationship I’ve had since the twelfth grade, I’ve compared what I felt for them to what I’ve felt for you. And it never measures up.” He sighed; rubbed his eyes. “Look, I’m not asking for anything from you. I always figured that you didn’t…that you didn’t care. That you didn’t love me back even though I thought…it doesn’t matter. I just always wondered. If there was a reason. If there was something I could fix.”  
  
“It’s not…” Annie struggled to put her emotions into words. “It’s not about me, Jesse; that’s not why I’m upset. I just can’t understand how you can think you’re in love with me, or that you’ve been pining away for me... It just…well to be honest, it sounds like bullshit.”  
  
Jesse laughed bitterly. She could feel the pressure building in his veins. “Yeah, you’re right. Bullshit. Because I’m Jesse Lacey, right? The asshole; the egomaniac. Of course I don’t love you. I don’t love anyone, right? Except myself. Because I’m just a miserable fuck desperate for validation, for comfort, for someone to stroke my ego and my cock.”  
  
“Jesse,” Annie gasped, stunned by the corrosive hatred in his voice.  
  
“No. Forget it. There’s nothing you could say to me that I don’t already know. I bet I could tell _you_ a few things though.” He pulled himself off the couch, stumbling around in the limited space of Annie’s apartment.  
  
“That’s what you want to hear, right? That’s what you want me to admit? Well _fine_. You know what I love? I love thinking about all the teenage girls out there who touch themselves late at night to the sound of my voice. Lying there in the dark, hoping their parents don’t hear their moans. Who say my name when they come, think of me, wish for me. I love fucking the girls who hang around backstage and the busses and beg me to let them give me a blowjob and leave them cold. Forget their names. Never even ask. Because mine’s the only one that matters. And I love when they’re drunk and they throw themselves at me and I shouldn’t take them home but I do anyway. Because the morning after at least they have a _story_ to tell; they got their brains fucked out by Long Island’s next rock star –”  
  
He stopped himself, worn out, miserable, vicious.  
  
Annie sighed. “There is so much wrong with what you just said,” she mumbled.  
  
“Tell me about it,” muttered Jesse in return. He sank to the floor, resting his head on his knees.  
  
“Well for one thing, teenage girls don’t masturbate,” Annie said sharply.  
  
Jesse was surprised enough by her response to look up. “What?”  
  
“Teenage girls don’t masturbate. I mean, some of them do. And some of them touch themselves but not to climax. But the majority of girls lose their virginity long before their first orgasm. So assuming your female fanbase isn’t tapped directly from some well of the especially sexualized, it’s pretty goddamn unlikely that there are too many teenage girls out there fucking themselves to the thought of you.”  
  
“Teenage girls don’t masturbate?” Jesse repeated weakly.  
  
Annie nodded sagely. “People think that just because women can go to college and get a job, we’re somehow sexually liberated. But we’re not. By the feminist movement’s own standards, they were a total failure. Female sexuality is kept such a _secret_ in our culture. Every teenage boy with an internet connection watches porn and whacks off, but girls are still taught to be so fucking _repressed_. Because sex is still about _men’s_ pleasure, not women’s. Women’s lib is such a _joke_.”  
  
Jesse just stared at her, apparently overwhelmed and confused by her sudden outburst on female sexuality.  
  
“But that’s just one thing,” said Annie hastily. “For another thing, it’s not like you’re the first band dude to realize that fucking the groupies gives him a huge ego boost. I mean, _shit_ , it would be weirder if you didn’t. It doesn’t make you some evil fucking sociopath. And do you really think you’re the only one benefiting from that relationship? Girls don’t sleep with guys in bands by mistake. They want it for their own, equally-if-not-more-so fucked up reasons.  
  
“Everyone takes advantage of people, Jesse. Everyone. What do you think happened at my job interview, huh? I asked them to call me, ‘Ann’ and dressed up all tasteful but understated and told them how _meaningful_ my experience with Teach for America was because I know people like that bust their bourgeoisie cherries over the thought of their spoiled little geniuses being exposed to someone with enough experience with black kids to be the star of a fucking Lifetime movie. And I got a salary plus benefits out of that. That’s worth a lot more than a quickie in the bathroom of a club.  
  
“Everyone’s a taker. You’re not so fucking special.”  
  
Silence rang out between them. They both remained very still.  
  
“I don’t know what to say,” said Jesse quietly. “I don’t know how to prove that I’m being honest. I know I’m this messed up person. I know you could never care about me. But I did love you. And I still feel it. I’ve loved other people, but every relationship I’ve had at its best – there was this hollowness. I knew it wasn’t real. I knew I could feel more and that I didn’t.”  
  
He ran his fingers through his hair. His eyes were fixed on his shoes. “I’m sorry if I was ever mean to you in high school. But I couldn’t look at you, knowing you were thinking about John. Wanting him. Knowing that he got to touch you and kiss you and talk to you on the phone while you fell asleep, and I didn’t. I couldn’t even say your name without it hurting.  
  
“I saw you two, you know, on prom night, right before you went into your room. I was on my way upstairs and I looked up and saw you, and I knew what was going to happen, and that after that it was over for me. No chance. You were his. That was the night I gave up hope.  
  
“It was easier to be around you after that.”  
  
Annie _had_ noticed the change in him after prom night – she’d attributed it to a combination of the moment they’d shared when she cried and Jesse’s relief that she would be leaving for college in the fall. She felt a wave of emotion crash over her; caught a taste of the wretchedness of his situation. Because it wasn’t like the girl he liked had dated just anyone else – Annie had dated his best friend.  
  
“I’m going to go,” Jesse said. He was already standing.  
  
“Oh. Okay,” said Annie. She stood and walked him to the door.  
  
Jesse paused in the doorway, and they looked at each other – neither making eye contact; her eyes were fixed on his forehead; his were on her throat.  
  
And then he turned and left, and Annie shut the door behind him.  
  
For a moment she was relieved, but then she felt a sick weight in the pit of her stomach, and she was certain that Jesse was going to die. Not in the abstract, not some day, but that night; maybe not on purpose but he would get wasted and fall off a pier or get in a bar fight with the wrong people. And die miserable and alone.  
  
She didn’t think past that. She threw the door open and plunged into the hall, flew to the stairway, leaned much too far over the rail and cried, “Jesse, _wait_!”


	4. Chapter 4

He paused on the stairs; looked up at her. Annie rushed down to meet him.  
  
“Jesse,” she breathed, “I’m sorry too. Okay? I’m sorry. I don’t hate you. I don’t not care about you. And if you died tonight I’d be really upset.”  
  
“Okay,” said Jesse. “Thanks.”  
  
He didn’t seem to understand that this was a life-and-death situation. And Annie didn’t understand _why_ it was, either, but she was positive that it _was_. She grabbed his arm, tugged gently. “Come back to my apartment. We’ll talk more. Or not talk. Whatever. Just don’t go. If you go, you’re going to die and it’ll be my fault. Please.”  
  
Jesse was looking at her hands. All of a sudden she realized how rarely they touched.  
  
“If it’ll make you feel better,” he said quietly.  
  
The reentered Annie’s place and stood for a moment in silence, both with slumped shoulders and averted eyes. “Don’t you have a job?” Jesse asked finally.  
  
“Yeah,” said Annie, “I teach an SAT prep course.”  
  
“So…is sleeping between now and then something you want to do?”  
  
“I go in late tomorrow,” said Annie. She glanced at the clock. “But at this point, yes, sleeping would be a good course of action. I’ll sleep on the floor; you take the bed.”  
  
“No, I’ll take the floor,” said Jesse.  
  
They both looked around, realizing that there wasn’t enough floor space for either of them to lay down stretched out.  
  
“If I offer to let you sleep in the bed with me, will you take it the right way?”  
  
“What’s the right way to take it?”  
  
“Like I don’t want to have sex with you but I do want you to sleep here tonight because I think you’ll die otherwise and there’s literally nowhere but my bed on which to sleep comfortably.”  
  
Jesse thought for a moment. “I could take it like that.”  
  
Annie dug up a T-shirt for Jesse to sleep in. He changed in the closet while she put on a tank top and her absolutely rattiest T-shirt in the bathroom.  
  
They negotiated climbing into bed wordlessly. Annie stayed at the extreme edge of her side; Jesse, perhaps in a gesture of good faith, did the same on his.  
  
Annie hadn’t realized how tired she was until her head sank into the softness of her pillow. She longed to fall asleep, but couldn’t quite allow herself to do it until she heard Jesse’s breathing turn slow and even.  
  


*

  
She half woke up a few hours later, one small portion of her mind alert and panicked but the rest sluggish with sleep. Her eyelids felt heavy and thick but she managed to open them. In the orange glow of streetlights that slipped through her window shades, Annie could make out Jesse’s face floating above her.  
  
“God, Jesse, what the fuck,” she mumbled, her speech slurred. Her hand shot out and she pushed him away, off to the side; his body gave easily, and she just barely registered his weight collapsing onto the mattress. As her arm dropped, her hand, of its own volition, fluttered to the waistband of her shorts; felt that they were in place and that her underwear was still on underneath. The fear still tickling her mind so eased, Annie immediately fell back to sleep.  
  
The sound of her alarm, set well before Jesse had shown up at her door, woke her at the appropriate time the next morning, and Annie awoke slightly confused. The throw pillows that she usually left on her bed were on the floor and she was curled up at the edge of the mattress instead of in the middle and her apartment smelled good but she didn’t know why.  
  
After a minute it came back, though; Jesse’s visit and confession and her belief that he would die if he left. _Why_ had she invited him to stay the night? Where had the panic over his mortality come from?  
  
She then registered that her apartment was completely silent – or, more accurately, devoid of any noises that would indicate the presence of another person. She could hear a garbage truck outside and her upstairs neighbor walking around.  
  
Annie sat up and looked around her briefly; it was clear that Jesse was gone. She stood, stretched a little, and went to the kitchen.  
  
Her frying pan was drying in the dish rack. Set on the counter was a stack of freshly made pancakes, still a little warm. Underneath the plate was a note.  
  
“ _The No Seatbelt Song_ ”


End file.
